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Imran Siddiqui
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The Potterverse
Jan 1970
time: 00:37
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http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/07...main/index.html
quote:
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush will select U.S. Circuit Judge John Roberts Jr. to replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor on the nation's highest court, CNN has learned.
Two sources, including a Senate Judiciary Committee source, said Roberts will be Bush's choice when the president makes a formal announcement in a nationwide address at 9 p.m. ET.
Roberts, who serves on U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, took the bench in 2003 after his confirmation was held up for months by Senate Democrats.
From 1982 to 1986, he worked in the White House counsel's office, then at Hogan & Hartson law firm, and from 1989 to 1993 was the principal deputy solicitor general for the U.S. Department of Justice.
Roberts, 50, also clerked in 1980 and 1981 for Justice William Rehnquist before he was elevated to chief justice.
Roberts has argued 33 cases before the high court. He is considered by some a brilliant appellate lawyer who has impressed many in his work so far as a judge. He is a 1979 graduate of Harvard's Law School.
Two prominent liberal advocacy groups -- NARAL Pro-Choice America and the Alliance for Justice -- opposed Roberts' nomination because of the positions he argued as an advocate for the Reagan and first Bush administrations.
NARAL alleged that Roberts had actively worked to overturn the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that struck down state laws outlawing abortion.
The Alliance for Justice criticized Roberts for his arguments against the use of racial considerations by the public sector, known by its supporters as affirmative action.
O'Connor, 75, was the first woman appointed as a Supreme Court justice, and has served on the court since 1981.
Her replacement must be confirmed by the Senate, and senators have braced for a battle since she announced her retirement July 1.
Speculation about a replacement focused much of Tuesday on another woman: Edith Clement, a judge on the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, based in New Orleans, Louisiana. One source said she was one of the finalists and confirmed she had met with Bush this past weekend.
Other names that had been mentioned as possible candidates include Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, Bush's former legal adviser; federal appellate judges J. Michael Luttig and James Harvie Wilkinson, both of whom serve on the Richmond, Virginia-based 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals; and another judge from the 5th Circuit, Emilio Garza.
This is the first Supreme Court vacancy since 1994, when President Clinton nominated Stephen Breyer. President Reagan appointed O'Connor, who took her seat as associate justice on September 25, 1981.
On Saturday, Bush said in his weekly radio address that he wanted the confirmation process to be nonpartisan.
"The nominee deserves fair treatment, a fair hearing and a fair vote. I will make my nomination in a timely manner so the nominee can be confirmed before the start of the court's new term in October," he said in his weekly radio address.
The president said he has been working with senators on the nomination process.
Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney met July 12 with four senators with key roles in the confirmation process: Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tennessee; Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada; Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, the Republican chairman of the Judiciary Committee; and the committee's ranking Democrat, Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont.
The senators said afterward that potential nominees were discussed, although Bush did not offer any names. They did commit to having O'Connor's replacement in place by the start of the court's new term in October.
Bush also met separately with Specter at the White House Monday evening. The senator would not divulge what was discussed.
Specter indicated on "Fox News Sunday" that he favored someone like O'Connor, who was often a swing vote on the court.
Bush, he said, should be able to stand "above the fray" and make an appointment that would be "in the national interest" -- not because he was "beholden to any group, no matter how much they contributed to his election."
"When you have these delicate questions, it's helpful to the country to have somebody who is a swing vote, which maintains the balance," Specter said.
The nominee is expected to meet with members of the Judiciary Committee next week before Congress takes a month off.
The Senate is scheduled to take a recess from August 1 through September 5, meaning confirmation hearings likely will begin after Labor Day.
Reid said before Roberts' nomination that hearings might last a "good long week" if the nominee is not controversial.
O'Connor remains at work; her retirement is effective when her successor is sworn in.
There had been speculation that Bush might have at least one more opening to fill on the court.
Rehnquist announced Thursday that he has no plans to step down and will continue to serve as long as he can.
"I want to put to rest the speculation and unfounded rumors of my imminent retirement," Rehnquist said in a statement released through his family. "I am not about to announce my retirement. I will continue to perform my duties as chief justice as long as my health permits."
The 80-year-old has been battling thyroid cancer since October and underwent a tracheotomy as part of his treatment. He endured weeks of chemotherapy and radiation. |
Seems to be more conservative than O'Conner. Though how much I'm not sure.
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Imran Siddiqui
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The Potterverse
Jan 1970
time: 00:37
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Another look:
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=sto..._co/scotus_bush
quote:
WASHINGTON -
President Bush chose federal appeals court judge John G. Roberts Jr. on Tuesday as his first nominee for the Supreme Court, selecting a rock-solid conservative who has won broad support from both parties but still faces what could be a contentious battle over the direction of the nation's highest court.
Bush offered the position to Roberts in a telephone call at 12:35 p.m. as he was hosting a luncheon for the prime minister of Australia, John Howard. He was to announce it later with a flourish in a nationally broadcast speech to the nation.
His selection was somewhat of a surprise since there had been some expectations that he would replace retiring Justice
Sandra Day O'Connor with a woman or minority.
Roberts has been on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit since June 2003 after being picked for that seat by Bush.
Advocacy groups on the right say that Roberts, a 50-year-old native of Buffalo, N.Y., who attended Harvard Law School, is a bright judge with strong conservative credentials he burnished in the administrations of former Presidents Bush and Reagan. While he has been a federal judge for just a little more than two years, legal experts say that whatever experience he lacks on the bench is offset by his many years arguing cases before the Supreme Court.
Liberal groups, however, say Roberts has taken positions in cases involving free speech and religious liberty that endanger those rights. Abortion rights groups allege that Roberts, while deputy solicitor general during former President Bush's administration, is hostile to women's reproductive freedom and cite a brief he co-wrote in 1990 that suggested the Supreme Court overturn
Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 high court decision that legalized abortion.
"The court's conclusion in Roe that there is a fundamental right to an abortion ... finds no support in the text, structure or history of the Constitution," the brief said.
In his defense, Roberts told senators during his 2003 confirmation hearing that he would be guided by legal precedent. "Roe v. Wade is the settled law of the land. ... There is nothing in my personal views that would prevent me from fully and faithfully applying that precedent."
While he doesn't have national name recognition, Roberts is a Washington insider who has worked over the years at the White House, Justice Department and in private practice.
In the Reagan administration, Roberts was special assistant to the attorney general and associate counsel to the president. Between 1989 and 1993, he was principal deputy solicitor general, the government's second highest lawyer, who argues cases before the
U.S. Supreme Court.
In the early 1980s, Roberts was a clerk for Rehnquist before Reagan elevated the retiring jurist to the top chair in 1986.
It was Rehnquist who presided over the swearing-in ceremony when Roberts took his seat on the appeals court for the District of Columbia. It took a while for Roberts to get on the bench. He was nominated for the court in 1992 by the first President Bush and again by the president in 2001. The nominations died in the Senate both times. He was renominated in January 2003 and joined the court in June 2003.
Roberts' nomination to the appellate court attracted support from both sites of the ideological spectrum. Some 126 members of the District of Columbia Bar, including officials of the Clinton administration, signed a letter urging his confirmation. The letter said Roberts was one of the "very best and most highly respected appellate lawyers in the nation" and that his reputation as a "brilliant writer and oral advocate" was well deserved.
"He has been a judge for only two years and authored about 40 opinions, only three of which have drawn any dissent," said Wendy Long, a lawyer representing the conservative Judicial Confirmation Network, adding that his record appears to suit Bush's desire to nominate a judge who will apply the law, as written, and leave policy decisions to the elected branches of government. |
So it doesn't look to tilt the Court on abortion, but on other things, we may be seeing a rightward shift.
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Drake Tungsten
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Knee deep in alien womyn...
Oct 2001
time: 14:37
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Roberts doesn't have much of a paper trail, which is probably a major reason he got the nod. It's going to be more difficult for the Democrats to portray him as an extremist than it would have been with some of the other candidates.
I'm not too excited by the pick myself, but I understand that political considerations outweigh overall competence these days. Nominating the most brilliant jurist around is pointless if you can't get them confirmed...
edit: I was too hard on Roberts in this post; he sounds like an ideal candidate. I'm just bummed McConnell didn't get it. Maybe for chief justice?
Last edited by Drake Tungsten on 20-07-2005 at 07:44
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asleepathewheel
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listening too long to one song
Mar 2002
time: 00:37
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only 50? He's going to be around for a long long time.
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Lancer
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Oregon Coast, USA! or Bohol, Philippines!
Apr 1999
time: 05:37
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quote:
Originally posted by Geronimo
which of his views do you find best illustrate this idiocy? |
My guess is that at no point did he affirm his willingness to 'hit it'.
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snoopy369
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Of the Peanuts Gallery
Apr 2004
time: 23:37
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Actually, Roberts' statements make me feel fairly good about him.
He's technically right - regardless of your stance on abortion - that Roe has little grounding in the Constitution. It was a bit of judicial activism in the 1970s - as I said, doesn't matter if you agree or not, and judicial activism isn't necessarily bad - but nonetheless he's technically accurate.
On the other hand, he's making the right statement - that he supports legal precedent. That's pretty much the rule in the Supreme court - and why a lot of legal scholars agree that Roe probably won't be overturned even if a conservative anti-Roe justice is selected; only two justices, Scalia and Thomas, are likely themselves to vote against the precedent, so they'd have to find 2 more that are willing to go against the legal precedent. Supreme Court Justices generally support precedent whenever possible - the idea being that consistent interpretation of the law is actually more valuable than completely accurate interpretation, when it's close. That's similar to an umpire in baseball (or any other sport); if the umpire calls a consistent strike zone, nobody really cares whether it's tight or loose (except the hitter that strikes out on a close call of course  ) because it's consistent and predictable. Consistency in law is very valuable, because having laws change every five or ten years is a bad thing - it sets up a moving target, and the ultimate implication, if the Supreme Court is willing to blow with the wind, is that the Supreme Court loses influence, and nobody wants that. 
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20-07-2005 05:19
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